


Cherished

by artku



Category: Fairy Tail
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Grayza - Freeform, Grayza Fanzine, Light Angst, Sexual situation but not a lemon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-22
Updated: 2020-04-22
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:02:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,633
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23785204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artku/pseuds/artku
Summary: In a rare moment of vulnerability, Erza chooses to share herself with Gray; the same way he shared himself with her.Set at the end of the Galuna Island arc.
Relationships: Gray Fullbuster/Erza Scarlet
Kudos: 24
Collections: Grayza Fanzine





	Cherished

**Author's Note:**

> The lovely mods of the Grayza fanzine told me to go ahead and post my fics on here! So hurrah! I still highly recommend you download it (google search Grayza fanzine tumblr, you'll find the link there) because they have some fantastic artwork on there, that really makes my fics look so much better T_T.

He is laughing. The firelight burnishes his hair bronze and he is chatting and drinking and laughing. She knows he is pretending. She can see the strain around his eyes, the grief of the unshed tears yet to come. Her heart aches for him. When the demon girl leads him to the space between the refectory tables, having finally coerced him into a dance he was too polite to refuse, she steps forward. The movement is small, but he notices. He always notices her. They look at each other for a spare second before she turns away, heading away from the circle of huts. A hastily mumbled excuse later he is with her.

The silvered grass in the forest looks as sharp as her blades. Erza almost expects it to crunch underfoot when she steps close to him. She traces the cut on his temple, its position giving him a rakish appearance. The muscles in his abdomen jump when she touches the wound in his side, and she whisks her hand away swiftly. "I heard you tried to use Iced Shell."

He does not respond but she can see the shame that puckers his brow. She wonders if he knows how unhappy she would be if he was no longer around. "Try it again and I'll kill you myself." The look on his face tells her he does.

He had revealed himself to her that day. She remembers the strength in his eyes as he caught her sword, how he did not flinch as the blade dug into his skin. The drops of blood that had fallen to the floor were as dark as his determination. Their guild mark stands proudly against his pale skin. The same mark he had held her sword to, as if to say, cut it out. Cut out my heart, my family. He would do this, even if it meant losing everything. Losing her. In that moment, she knew him. He had revealed himself to her. Revealed the hurt that had transmuted into steely resolve.

"Cut me down if you want," he had said as he had left the tent. His body had been banged up but he had wanted to fight on. Until he was broken and battered and there was nothing left of him. The set of his shoulders saying, 'This is something only I can do. Damn the consequences.'

She understands the feeling. And fears it. One day she too must reckon with her past.

Her face is reflected in his dark eyes. They seem to know her too. Who she is and who she will be. She knows then, that maybe, just maybe, she can reveal herself to him in turn. That she will not be met with judgement.

With trembling fingers, she undoes the gauntlet on her left hand, pulling it off and throwing it to the ground. It is so quiet in the clearing that she hears his heart skip a beat. His lips part, as if he wants to say something but is afraid that by speaking, he will shatter the moment.

Her right gauntlet clinks as it joins its pair. Her nerves are jangling so forcefully that she is almost surprised they have not burst out of her body in a bid for freedom. She feels exposed. More clinking as a vambrace is removed. She can requip her armour off in a flash, but this… it is symbolic. She is inviting him into her world. Showing herself to him in a way that no one has seen her for a long time. The way he had shown himself to her.

The second vambrace drops and her hands are shaking too much to carry on. He moves to her, his hands gently stilling her quivering body. With aching tenderness, he unstraps the couter on her elbow, his eyes never leaving hers, checking all the while if she is OK. She nods at him. This was harder than she had thought it would be. His eyes tell her that he understands. That he recognises what a privilege this is. What an honour. They tell her that he will take his time doing it, because he wants this moment to last forever.

The couters, the spaulders, the faulds around her waist, they all come off. He piles them carefully on the ground, almost as if he is building a shrine to her. Who she had been before this night. Who she had been to him. A person walled off and hiding; someone untouchable. He reaches around her to undo the steel culet at the small of her back and she shivers, the gentleness of his touch sending diamonds skittering along her skin. When at last the gorget from around her narrow neck is on the ground and only her cuirass remains, she stays his hand. She swallows the lump in her throat almost violently and pulls off the final plate of her armour.

Her hands fist at her side and she fights the instinct to try to cover herself. Standing there, clad in only a black t-shirt and her navy skirt, she feels naked. A warm hand slides across her cheek to cup her face; it makes her forget to fidget.

The look in his eyes both thrills and frightens her and his breath is warm and sweet as it mingles with hers. She is not sure if he says something then, but she reaches up and closes the gap between their lips anyway.

He kisses her like she is the most precious thing in his world. Like he will break if he had to leave her. His calloused fingers whisper a thousand secrets to her as they stroke her cheeks and tangle themselves in her hair.

When she tugs him towards the ground, he curses himself for not bringing a jacket and it makes her laugh. A small, cruel part of her wonders if she is laughing at him. At how much he cares for her. How little she deserves it.

The grass under her bare thighs is as soft as his touch and it fills the air with the smell of summertime. He undresses her slowly, almost reverentially, his lips igniting tiny bonfires against her skin. And when he pulls off her heavy, unyielding boots and presses a kiss to the arch of her foot, her heart clenches because it, she, feels perfect.

His shins are strong under her as she undoes his belt and she has to stop for a moment to study him. The moonlight ripples glacially over his skin, dancing in and out of the shadows made by the grooves of his muscles. She thinks it is ironic; that his hard body looks as soft as buttercream and her soft skin looks as hard as marble and that maybe somewhere in between the irony is a deeper meaning that she does not care to think about. He pulls her to him and rolls them over and the thought is banished to the back of her mind.

She knows the words he will not speak. Words he knows that she is not ready to hear. That maybe she will never be ready to hear. But they spill out from behind closed lips anyway; in the way he cradles her face when he kisses her, the way he coaxes the moans from her fluttering lips, the way he worships her. Silk slides against silk as his hair brushes against her thighs. She thinks of all the ways in which he shows himself to her, revealing himself, exposing his heart. She thinks and thinks until she can think no more.

He kisses his way up her perspiring body, all the way up to her panting face. She sees herself reflected in his eyes, all her doubts and fears and most of all just her. Who she is. Her essence. "You're bleeding," he whispers, his eyes drifting to the spot on her lip where she had bit herself to stop from screaming. He gently licks the blood off her lip and kisses her. Her taste on his tongue makes her think that maybe, just maybe this could be all she ever needed. That she could teach herself to live with this.

With a gentleness she did not know she possessed; she reaches for him. His velvet length in her hand as hard as his eyes are soft. His breath hitches as she caresses him, and he shuts his eyes to hide from her how much he wants this. How much he wants her. There is a crinkle as a foil-wrapped package appears in her hand, pulled from her pocket dimension just as the worry frets his forehead. He laughs at her timing, her ability to always read his mind. It makes her grin. She rolls it over him with a smoothness that belies her inexperience. And when she guides him to her she knows that while she does not deserve this, he does.

The stars in the sky above her whisper to her the secrets of the universe and when she closes her eyes, she can still see them, exploding like fireworks under her eyelids. He laces his fingers with hers and presses kisses to her face; her forehead, her cheeks, her eyelids, the corner of her mouth. And when he moves in her, she understands at last, what it is to be cherished.

He falls asleep with his face buried in the crook of her neck, his hand holding hers to his steadily beating heart. His weight is heavy and solid against her. She knows he will never hurt her. That he would always protect her better than any armour ever could. She knows, if she let him, he would love her.

She is gone in the morning before he wakes.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to Sou, who did the artwork that appeared alongside this fic (I know it wasn't specifically meant to go together but it just DID and I LOVE how it turned out)
> 
> As always, please leave a comment/kudos if you feel like it :) (though I really hope you feel like it. I'm really quite proud of this one)  
> (Also I love love love love getting comments, that's why this is up here and not just in the zine)


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